


Fundamentals

by floraltohru



Category: Fruits Basket, Fruits Basket (Anime 2019), Fruits Basket - Takaya Natsuki (Manga)
Genre: Domestic, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Gardens & Gardening, I really think that covers all the basis, Martial Arts, Multi, Polyamory, Self-Defense, You may want to make an appointment with your dentist, real sweet
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:07:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24244018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/floraltohru/pseuds/floraltohru
Summary: As Yuki, Tohru, and Kyo build their lives together as adults, they fill a few gaps in their education.
Relationships: Honda Tohru/Sohma Kyou/Sohma Yuki
Comments: 16
Kudos: 61





	1. Gardening

Kyo is _hovering_. He’s trying to be casual about it, but he’s never been subtle about anything, ever, at least not as long as Yuki’s known him, which has been practically their whole lives. Yuki glances over his shoulder, his forearms deep in the raised bed in their backyard, and raises an eyebrow at Kyo. “Can I help you?” he asks. 

Kyo stumbles backward, now hyper-aware of how close he was, and bumps into Tohru. She flails her arms in a wide arc to balance herself, knocking off her sunhat and dropping her basket in the process. He hooks an arm around her waist, steadying her. “Sorry about that,” he says. “That was my fault, this time.” 

“Clumsy Kyo,” she says, poking him in the side with a finger. He dusts off her sunhat and sets it back on her head, lopsided. 

“Curious cat coming to oversee the garden?”

“Something like that,” Kyo murmurs, blushing. 

Yuki steps aside, gesturing to the raised bed. “By all means.” 

Kyo leans forward, staring intently at the dirt. “That’s… definitely a garden.” 

“Did you come all the way out here to gift us with that pearl of wisdom?” Yuki asks, his voice needling at Kyo much more gently than he used to. 

“No,” Kyo mumbles. “Thought maybe you could…” 

“Speak up,” Yuki teases, elbowing him softly. 

“I thought maybe you guys could show me how to…” He gestures vaguely to the raised bed in front of them. 

“Kyo! You want to learn how to garden?” Tohru asks, bouncing on her tiptoes enthusiastically. 

“I guess.” He prods at the dirt tentatively. “But I’m not planting any _damn_ chives.”

Tohru laughs, and it drifts through the warm air like the ringing of chimes from the back porch. “Don’t worry Kyo, we won’t make you grow any chives. Today we’re planting zucchini.” 

“Relatively hardy, high-yield, low-maintenance,” Yuki tells him. “Though,” he turns to Tohru, “I’m a bit concerned that the skins will pit if the temperature drops again.” 

She frowns. “I think it’ll be warm enough. But we’ll cover them if it gets too cold.” 

Yuki turns back to Kyo. “Hand.” 

Kyo puts his hand out, and Yuki drops a handful of seeds into them.

“You’ll want to plant them two to four feet apart,” she tells Kyo. “Or else you run the risk of disease and poor air circulation.” She’s got that adorable determined look on her face that they both love so much, as though she has some kind of personal vendetta against blight and mildew. As if Tohru Honda has a personal vendetta against anything. 

Kyo looks back and forth between the two of them, wide eyed, and it kind of reminds him of a recurring dream he used to have when he was in school where he showed up to take a test and it was all in a language he couldn’t comprehend. 

“Calm down,” Yuki says, and when he sets his hand on Kyo’s shoulder he leaves behind a smear of dirt on his T-shirt. “We’ll tell you if you’re doing something wrong.” 

“You can do it, Kyo,” Tohru says, beaming. 

“We already warmed the soil, and the drainage should be right. We even soaked the seeds, all you have to do is plant them.” 

Kyo nods, then holds one of the seeds up, examining it. “Alright. Let’s do this already.” 

Tohru laughs. “You don’t need to be nervous, Kyo. It’s just zucchini.” 

Yuki dips the tip of his spade into the dirt. “You’ll want to dig your holes about an inch deep. And now just drop in a couple seeds.” 

He follows Yuki’s instructions to the letter. “Now you’ll smooth the dirt over the top,” Tohru says, and Yuki demonstrates with the spade. 

“Now you try,” Yuki says, handing the spade over. 

Kyo copies Yuki’s motions exactly, focusing intently. He’s about to dig two holes too close together, but Yuki places a gentle hand on his wrist and guides him further down the plot. “Better,” he says. 

“That looks far enough apart,” Tohru agrees. 

Kyo pinches his tongue between his teeth, digging in with the spade again.

“It doesn’t have to be exactly an inch, Kyo,” Yuki says, a laugh creeping in at the edges of his voice. “Just close.” 

Tohru pats his shoulder gently. “You’re so tense!” she says. 

“I just don’t want to mess up your garden,” he tells them. 

Tohru stands on her tiptoe to press a kiss to his temple. “That’s very sweet of you, Kyo.” 

“I promise you won’t mess up our garden,” Yuki says. “And we could use your help.”

Kyo nods, and starts digging again. Under Tohru’s and Yuki’s watchful eyes, he plants the entire row of zucchini. “Nice work, Kyo,” Tohru tells him, wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head against his chest. “Now we just have to wait a few weeks, and then they’ll be ready to harvest.” 

“A few weeks?” Kyo says, and Yuki laughs. 

“It’s a slow process,” he says. 

“Oh!” Tohru cries, pulling away. “I’ve got to go get dinner out of the oven! I hope it didn’t burn!” 

She takes off through the yard, her boys following her as the sun begins its languid dip toward the horizon. 

“You know, I was worried about the pollination but that seems to be a non-issue,” Yuki says brightly, smiling at the flowers and greenery spread out before him. 

“Hang on, you’ve got…” Kyo trails off as he brings his thumb up to wipe a stray streak of dirt from Yuki’s nose, Tohru giggling as he does. 

“Oh, thanks,” Yuki says absently, his focus resting squarely on the plants in front of him. “What do you think?” he asks Tohru, gesturing to a zucchini. “I’m inclined to say we should wait until tomorrow, maybe even the day after.” 

She nods, the wide brim of her hat bobbing as she does. “I think you’re right. It’s not quite ready.” 

He turns to Kyo, the no-nonsense cadence of what Kyo and Tohru occasionally refer to as his ‘teacher voice’ returning. “Zucchini should be between four and six inches long. Too short, and they’re underripe. Too long, and they’ll turn bitter and seedy.” 

“Got it.” Kyo scans over the garden, finding one that looks right. “Good?” he asks, motioning to it.

Tohru leans in, examining it. “Perfect!” she says. 

“Shears,” Yuki says, holding out a hand. Tohru hands them to him and he snips at the plant with surgical precision, placing the squash in Tohru’s basket tenderly. “Now you try,” he says, handing them to Kyo. 

Kyo looks for another, finding one under a thick blanket of leaves. “This looks right,” he says, and the other two nod at him encouragingly. He trims a bit too close to the plant itself, but otherwise it’s textbook, according to his resident gardening experts. 

He feels a little swell of pride, holding the zucchini in his hand. There’s a certain thrill to making something where there was nothing before; it makes him feel almost like some kind of wizard. 

“Congratulations,” Yuki says, looping an arm around Kyo’s waist. “You did it.”

“Yeah, I guess I did,” he says.

Tohru presses a kiss to his cheek. “We’re proud of you,” she says. 

“Yeah?” It’s not a new sentiment. He knows Tohru is proud of him; Yuki too, he supposes. But it still catches him a bit off guard every time he hears it. 

“Of course,” Yuki says, and he rests his head on Kyo’s shoulder, the three of them admiring their little slice of paradise. 

“What should we make?” Tohru asks at last, her tone chipper as ever. “Bread? Muffins? I think I saw a recipe for zucchini pancakes somewhere…” 

“Pancakes?” Kyo marvels. “That sounds…” 

“Weird,” Yuki finishes for him. “Let’s stick with bread. For now.” 

Tohru sticks her tongue out at him, and Yuki pulls her close. “I’m sorry, it’s just that your zucchini bread is the best I’ve had, I wouldn’t want to miss out on any.” 

“My zucchini bread is the only zucchini bread you’ve had,” she says, swatting playfully at his arm. 

He chuckles lightly. “You’ve got me there.” 

They nearly make it back to the house, but just outside the door, Tohru decides she wants to sit outside and watch the sunset. She admires the sky, shifting in shades of gold and magenta and violet, and she holds each of their hands in her lap, regardless of how grimy they are from a day of yard work. They sit on the porch until the stars start winking in the sky, and only once it’s completely dark do they venture inside. 

After that, Kyo keeps joining them at the garden, the three of them huddled around the raised bed sowing, reaping, appraising, harvesting, feeding, watering, growing. He ends up with dirt under his nails, too much sun on his shoulders, and, occasionally, a stomachache from laughing too hard. And despite his protests, when the next growing season comes around, he even helps with the damn chives.


	2. Self-Defense

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With a little help from Yuki, Kyo teaches Tohru a few basic maneuvers.

The weather is sunny and bright, so Kyo has left the door to the courtyard open while he teaches his beginner class, and he’d be lying if he said the gentle breeze was the only reason. In truth, from this angle, he can see Tohru perched under one of the maple trees studying him. Her book sits on her lap, untouched, her hand serving as a bookmark even though she hasn’t made any progress since she sat down. Every once in a while, he glances up and catches her eye before returning to whichever student whose form he was correcting. When class is finally over, his young students follow him out of the dojo, chattering in his ear and tugging at his pants leg and firing off a hundred thousand questions. 

Tohru rises to greet him, her purse slung over her shoulder and her smile ever-present. She seems to be trying to contain herself, to keep her distance as she watches him chat with his students and send them off until next week with instructions to keep practicing. Tohru sees one of them point to her and ask loudly, “Is that your wife, sensei?” Kyo laughs and ruffles his hair, then bends down to whisper something in his ear before sending him off. 

“Cute,” she murmurs once they’re finally alone, pressing a kiss to his cheek. 

“You were staring,” he says, tapping his knuckles lightly to her head. “Do you always watch like that?” Her eyes go wide and she starts to babble in that way that she does sometimes, but he cuts her off with a laugh and pulls her in for a hug, grateful with every breath that he can do that now. “You want me to teach you?” 

“Oh!” she says, like she hasn’t thought of it already. And maybe she hasn’t - maybe it’s one of those desires she keeps so close to her chest she can’t see it herself. “That would be great, Kyo.”

“Wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to at least learn some self-defense,” he rationalizes. He takes her hand and they start walking back to their house. _Their house._ That never gets old. “You are a little…” He trails off and appraises her, her eyes wide and focusing on him so intently that she loses her footing and trips. He steadies her, trying not to laugh. “You know.” 

“I’ll learn whatever you can teach me!” she says. She elbows him lightly and adds, “Sensei.” And he’s pretty sure she just does it to get him hot under the collar, but of course he can’t prove it. 

Yuki is sitting on the stoop when they arrive home, a bit disheveled from the train ride to their house from campus. He sets his textbook aside and greets them with a warm smile. 

"Yuki!" Tohru cries, flinging her arms around him and knocking his reading glasses askew. "I thought you wouldn't be here until tomorrow night."

"And why are you out here? Did you lose your key again?" Kyo asked. 

"No classes tomorrow," he reminds Tohru. "And I have my key, I just wanted to wait for you to get home."

"You're so sweet," Tohru says, then nearly knocks him over with a kiss. 

"Be careful, Tohru, " Kyo says, and he ruffles Yuki's hair affectionately on the way into the house. 

"What do you want for dinner?" Tohru asks, gripping his hand and dragging him inside. 

"Whatever you're cooking," he says earnestly. "I haven't had a meal that's not takeout since the last time I was home.” 

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that!” Tohru cries out, scandalized, and she twitters anxiously all the way into the kitchen.

-

The hour after dinner finds the three of them in the backyard, the smell of clean linen drifting from the clothesline. 

Yuki sits with a mug of tea, studying his textbook intently, while Kyo corrects Tohru’s form as he tries to show her some basic moves. 

He stands behind her, his arms wrapped loosely around her waist. Her brow is set with fierce determination, her fists clenched at her side. 

“I’m ready!” she says. 

“Alright,” Kyo says, his lips quirked in a half-smile. “So first you’re going to want to step forward, that’ll shift your center of balance so you can stay on your feet while you’re trying to get away.” 

“Got it.” She steps forward, but he nudges the back of her calf with the toe of his shoe. 

“A little more,” he says. “No, that’s too far.”

“Hang on,” Yuki says, setting his reading glasses inside his open book. “Let me help you. It’ll be easier for you to explain if you’re not demonstrating too.” 

“Good call.” Kyo releases Tohru from his grasp and Yuki steps in. 

“Hi,” he murmurs, pressing a quick kiss to her cheek. 

“Hi yourself.” 

“Hey now, you’re supposed to be abducting her,” Kyo says. 

“Right,” Yuki says, and he pulls Tohru in closer. 

Kyo taps Tohru’s shoe with his own. “Step forward with this foot… There. Alright, lean forward a little bit.” Though she follows his instructions to the letter, Tohru still looks like she’s focusing all of her concentration on not falling over. He adjusts her elbow, showing her in slow motion where she would strike Yuki were he actually an attacker. 

“And then I’d run away,” she supplies helpfully. 

Kyo starts to chuckle, but then remembers the story Arisa told them, remembers hearing of a Tohru who yanked her friend away from would-be attackers and into the safety and comfort of a home and a mother who loved both of them. And he remembers that he loves her in part because she’s strong, even if she’s never going to be a prizefighter. Strong in her own way. A better way, even. 

“Alright, I’ve got another one for you,” he says, and he walks her through a set of basic motions. This time, however, she trips, taking Yuki down with her. 

Yuki and Tohru look up at Kyo from a tangled heap in the grass. He rolls his eyes and reaches out to pull them back up. 

“Thanks,” Tohru says, emphasizing her gratitude with a quick peck on the cheek. 

They don’t spend quite as much time on the ground after that, but not for lack of trying. It seems to Kyo that Tohru has never had a sense of balance, and that she might in fact be causing Yuki’s center of gravity to disappear altogether. 

It’s almost impressive. 

“Let’s take a break,” he says at last, and they collapse into a loose assemblage on the back step. Yuki drops his head to Kyo’s shoulder and Kyo snakes an arm around Tohru, pulling her close. 

Despite the warm air and the comforting weight of Tohru and Yuki on either side of him, the gloom moves in like it sometimes does. Kyo tries not to think about it but he must, inevitably. Even though it’s been years, even though he’s safe here and not there, imprisoned in the dark. It feels like a part of him - the part that had accepted the inevitability of his captivity, the part of his subconscious that had been resigned to confinement - is locked up in that dark room on the family estate. The life he’s living is the future he’d never let himself imagine before, but a part of him is still scared that it’s all an elaborate ruse. 

As if she can sense his sudden discomfort, Tohru leans in closer, pressing further into his side. “Thanks for teaching me.” 

“It’s no problem,” he says. “I want to make sure you can defend yourself is all.” 

“Thank you for always looking out for me. I know I can be a little…” 

“Inattentive?” Yuki supplies helpfully from Kyo’s other side. 

“It’s alright,” Kyo assures her. “You can space out as much as you want when we’re around. But in case we’re not…” He stands up again and offers her a hand. “Let’s try one more.” 

Kyo walks her through the steps of one last move, Yuki very helpfully standing in as her sparring dummy. 

“Do you think you’re ready to try it on your own?” he asks. 

“I can do this!” she says, eyes alight. 

“Don’t hold back,” Yuki instructs, and he lunges to grab her. 

The first time, he manages to pin her arms at her side and scoop her up in a hold. Kyo corrects her form, Yuki places her gently back on the grass, and they try again. 

The second time, she’s more successful. When he lunges, she pivots just like she was taught, and doesn’t even lose her footing. In a very un-Tohru-like display of grace and coordination, she somehow manages to flip Yuki onto his back in the grass in front of her. 

"Ha! I did it!" she cries. But her celebration is cut short when she panics, scrambling to help Yuki up off the ground. "Oh my goodness, are you alright? Did I hurt you?" 

The fall knocked the wind out of him, but he’s laughing when he stands. “No, that was great.” 

“That was pretty perfect,” Kyo admits, and Tohru blushes a bit when she catches the full force of his proud smile. 

“Let’s practice again tomorrow,” she says. She stands on her tiptoes to kiss him, his lips still quirked skyward. 

_Tomorrow._ That’s right, Kyo thinks absently as he watches Yuki and Tohru pull down the now-dry laundry. He gets to have tomorrow. And tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> catch me trying to act out various googled self-defense poses in my bedroom so i know how things work. 
> 
> i'm @floraltohru on tumblr, it's a real rager over there. come say hi.

**Author's Note:**

> not sure what to say about this one. it's pretty straightforward. googled a lot of Zucchini Facts. i wrote it a while ago, this was supposed to be the second chapter but then the first chapter was tripping me up a bit so this is the first chapter instead aaand once i figure out the first-turned-second chapter i guess i'll post that too! 
> 
> i'm on tumblr @floraltohru. slide into my dms. or don't. it's whatever.


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